New Suitcase Named “Hop” Can Follow Its Owner

Travelling should be pleasant but dragging the luggage may spoil the mood of travelling. Many travelers feel that dragging luggage specially at the airport is a pain and hassle. If there were such luggage that would follow the luggage owner, wouldn’t that be great? No worries. With the help of technology, that luggage is being developed. Madrid-based designer Rodrigo Garcia Gonzalez is trying to develop a new suitcase called “Hop” that can follow the travelers automatically. Aren’t you interested to know about it?

The very first question that may come in mind that why the name of the suitcase is “Hop”? Well, the suitcase is named “Hop” because people who are hired by the hotel management to carry guest’s luggage are called “bellhops”. And Hop is specially designed to avoid bellhops. So, how does the Hop follow the luggage owner itself? Well, the suitcase Hop has three receivers. These receivers are able to receive, identify and triangulate different (Bluetooth) signals coming from the luggage owner’s cell phone. Inside the suitcase, there’s a micro-controller that interprets these signals and calculates the distance between the suitcase and the cell phone. Besides interpreting signals and calculating distance, the micro-controller operates a caterpillar system based on compressed air. And hence, the suitcase follows the user (actually the suitcase follows the cell phone) at a constant distance. The measurement of this suitcase is supposed to be 55 cm x 40 cm x 20 cm (roughly 21 x 15 x 8 inches).

If the signal is lost, then the luggage owner’s cell phone will start vibrating to alert him/her and the suitcase will lock itself for its security. That’s not all. The suitcase is programmable. The suitcase can follow one to another person or it can even be controlled by multiple people if being programmed in that way.

However in short you can say Hop is an autonomous suitcase. At present, Hop is in the prototype stage. There is no clue when this autonomous suitcase will hit the market and what would be its price. If you want to know more information, just visit the official site.